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Month: March 2016

On this day in 1865, the final offensive of the Army of the Potomac gathers steam when Union General Philip Sheridan moves against the left flank of Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern

US General Philip Sheridan

Virginia near Dinwiddie Court House. The limited level action set the stage for the Battle of Five Forks, Virginia, on April 1. This engagement took place at the end of the Petersburg, Virginia, line. For 10 months, the Union had laid siege to Lee’s army at Petersburg, but the trenches stretched all the way to Richmond, some 25 miles to the north. Lee’s thinning army attacked Fort Stedman on March 25 in a futile attempt to break the siege, but the Union line held. On March 29, General Ulysses S. Grant,

Lt. General Ulysses S. Grant, USA

General-in-Chief of the Union Army and the field commander around Petersburg, began moving his men past the western end of Lee’s line.

Torrential rains threatened to delay the move as. Grant had planned to send Sheridan against the Confederates on March 31, but called off the operation. Sheridan would not be denied a chance to fight, though. “I am ready to strike out tomorrow and go to smashing things!” he told his officers. They en-couraged him to meet with Grant, who consented to begin the move. Near Dinwiddie Court House, Sheridan advanced but was driven back by General George Pickett’s division. Pickett was alerted to the

CSA General George Pickett, sartorial dandy and lowest in his class at West Point,

Union advance, and during the night of March 31, he pulled his men back to Five Forks. This set the stage for a major strike by Sheridan on April 1, when the Yankees crushed the Rebel flank and forced Lee to evacuate Richmond and Petersburg. The Rebel Confederacy had only a week left to live.

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On this day in 1825, Confederate General Samuel Maxey is born in Tompkinsville, Kentucky.

CSA General Samuel Maxey

During the Civil War, Maxey served in the West and led Native Americans troops in Indian Territory. Maxey attended the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and graduated in 1846, second to last in a class of 59. He was sent immediately to fight in the Mexican War (1846-48). Although he did well there and fought at the Battle of Cerro Gordo, Maxey resigned his commission after the war to study law in Kentucky. In 1857, he moved to Texas and became active in politics. When the war began, he raised a regiment, the 9th Texas Infantry, and took his unit to fight in Mississippi. Maxey was promoted to brigadier general in March 1862 and his force participated in the Vicksburg campaign before aiding in the defense of Port Hudson, Louisiana. He avoided capture when those locations fell into Union hands, and was sent to assist in the Confederate siege of Chattanooga, Tennessee, in September 1863.

While there, Maxey received a promotion to commander of Indian Territory. In 1864, he worked to recruit and train members of the Cherokee, Creek, and Choctaw tribes. On April 18, 1864, troops under Maxey’s command attacked a Union wagon train at Poison Spring, Arkansas. They routed the federal force, which was led by the 1st Kansas Colored Regiment. Maxey’s men proceeded to kill all black soldiers who were wounded or captured.

After the war, Maxey continued to support his Native American friends when he served in the U.S. Senate and was an outspoken advocate of Indian rights. He died in 1895.

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Today in 1865, with the end in sight, the final campaign of the Civil War begins in Virginia when Union troops under General Ulysses S. Grant begin to move against the Confederate trenches built around

Lt. General Ulysses S. Grant, USA

Petersburg. General Robert E. Lee’s outnumbered Rebels were soon forced to evacuate the city and

Robert E. Lee, General CSA

begin a desperate race to escape to the west.

Eleven months earlier, Grant had moved his army across the Rapidan River in northern Virginia and began the bloodiest campaign of the war. For six weeks, Lee and Grant fought along an arc that swung east of the Confederate capital at Richmond. They engaged in some of the conflict’s bloodiest battles at Wilderness, Spotsylvania, and Cold Harbor before settling into trenches for a siege of Petersburg, 25 miles south of Richmond. The fighting in the Wilderness and at Cold Harbor had earned Grant the uneviable nickname of “Butcher” as a result of the heavy casualties. Years later, Grant said that fight was a mistake. The trenches eventually stretched all the way to Richmond, and during the ensuing months the armies glowered at each other across a no man’s land. From time to time, Grant would launch attacks against sections of the Rebel defenses, but Lee’s men always managed to fend them off.

Time was running out for Lee, though, and he knew it. His army was dwindling in size to about 55,000, due to illness, soldiers not coming back from leave, and even mass desertions as the men could see the handwriting on the wall. On the other side of the trenches, Grant’s army continued to grow–the Army of the Potomac now had more than 125,000 men ready for service. On March 25, Lee attempted to split the Union lines when he attacked Fort Stedman, a stronghold along the Yankee trenches. His army was beaten back, and he lost nearly 5,000 men. On March 29, Grant seized the initiative, sending 12,000 men past the Confederates’ left flank and threatening to cut Lee’s escape route from Petersburg. Fight-ing broke out there, several miles southwest of the city. Lee’s men simply were not enought, in number or strength, to stop the Federal advance. On April 1, the Yankees struck at Five Forks, soundly defeat-ing the Rebels and leaving Lee no viable alternative. He pulled his forces from their trenches and raced west, followed by Grant. It was a race that even the great Lee could not win. Upon learning there were boxcars on a railroad siding that held the rations his men so desperately needed to go on, he fled to Danville. When he got there, the boxcars were there as well, but due to a mixup of instructions in the war Department, all they held was ammunition. Lee knew it was over, and there was no reason to sacrifice his men any further. He surrendered his army on April 9, 1865, at Appomattox Court House.

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Well, I added a spam blocker to the site, and what do you know? No more comments from anyone. As my dad used to say, ‘Shows to go you…’ I guess not as many..read very few…of those glowing comments I used to see were really valid or from real people. Oh well. I am doing this because I like it, and because it is fun. I see by the stats that a lot of people seem to be looking at it, so I will just hope that someone real decides to leave me a note someday. Sort of like throwing a bottle into the ocean and getting a response years later.

New things are coming soon, within the months of April. So keep checking in.

On this day in 1862, Union forces stop the Confederate invasion of New Mexico Territory when they turn the Rebels back at Glorieta Pass.

This action was part of the broader movement by the Confederates to capture New Mexico and other parts of the West. This would secure territory that the Rebels thought was rightfully theirs but had been denied them by political compromises made before the Civil War. The cash-strapped Confed-eracy was planning on using the wealth from the Western mines to fill its treasury. From San Antonio, the Rebels moved into southern New Mexico (which included Arizona at the time) and captured the towns of Mesilla, Donna Ana and Tucson. General Henry H. Sibley, with 3,000 troops, now moved north

General Henry Hopkins Sibley, CSA, and inventor of the Sibley Army tent

against the Federal stronghold at Fort Craig on the Rio Grande. Sibley’s force collided with Union troops at Valverde near Fort Craig on February 21, but the Yankees were unable to stop the invasion. Sibley left parts of his army to occupy Albuquerque and Santa Fe, and the rest of the troops headed east of Santa Fe along the Pecos River. Their next target was the Union garrison at Fort Union, an out-post on the other side of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. At Pigeon’s Ranch near Glorieta Pass, they encountered a Yankee force of 1,300 Colorado volunteers under Colonel John Slough. The battle began in late morning, and the Federal force was thrown back before taking cover among the adobe buildings of Pigeon’s Ranch. A Confederate attack late in the afternoon pushed the Union troops further down the pass, but nightfall halted the advance. Union troops snatched victory from the jaws of defeat when Major John Chivington led an attack on the Confederate supply train, burning 90 wagons and killing 800 animals. With their supplies destroyed, the Confederates had to withdraw to Santa Fe. They lost 36 men killed, 70 wounded, and 25 captured. The Union army lost 38 killed, 64 wounded, and 20 men captured. After a week in Santa Fe, the Rebels withdrew down the Rio Grande. By June, the Yankees controlled New Mexico again, and the Confederates did not return for the rest of the war.

Major John Chivingon, a hero at Glorieta Pass and a disgrace at Sand creek.

surprise morning raid on a band of “tame” – or non-aggressive — Indians who were camped under a United States flag of peace, at Sand Creek, Colorado, in a massacre that to this day is one of the most infamous acts of war on a peaceful people.

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In a disastrous setback for the Texans resisting Santa Anna’s dictatorial regime, the Mexican army defeats and executes 417 Texas revolutionaries at Goliad today in 1836.

Long accustomed to enjoying considerable autonomy from their Mexican rulers, many Anglo Texan settlers reacted with alarm when Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna proclaimed himself dictator of Mexico

General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna

in 1835. Santa Anna immediately imposed martial law and attempted to disarm the Texans. Yet, this move merely fed the flames of Texan resistance.

In November 1835, Texan leaders proclaimed their resistance to Santa Anna’s dictatorship, though they stopped short of calling for independence. The next month, the Texans managed to defeat 800 Mexican soldiers stationed in San Antonio. However, the rebel leaders remained deeply divided over what to do next, making them vulnerable to Santa Anna’s ruthless determination to suppress any further dissension. While the Texas rebels dallied, Santa Anna moved decisively. In mid-February he led a massive Mexican army across the Rio Grande, and after a 13-day siege of the Alamo, crushed the rebels in San Antonio. Meanwhile, to the south, Santa Ann’s chief lieutenant, General Urrea, moved to destroy another faction of the rebel army attempting to defend the town of Goliad.

Disagreements among the Texans had led to a division of the rebel forces. James W. Fannin was left

James Walker Fannin – leader of the failed mission to support the defenders at the Alamo

with only slightly more than 300 Texans to protect Goliad, a position the rebels needed in order to maintain their supply routes to the Gulf Coast. As Urrea’s much larger 1400-man army approached, Fannin acted with indecision, wondering if he should go to the aid of the besieged men at the Alamo.

Belatedly, Fannin attempted to fall back from the approaching Mexican army, but his retreat order came too late. On March 19, Urrea surrounded the small column of rebel soldiers on an open prairie, where they were trapped without food, water, or cover. After repulsing one Mexican assault, Fannin realized there was no chance of escape. Rather than see his force annihilated, Fannin surrendered.

Apparently, some among the Texans who surrendered believed they would be treated as prisoners of war. Santa Anna, however, had clearly stated several months before that he considered the rebels to be traitors who would be given no quarter. In obedience to Santa Anna’s orders, on this day in 1836 Urrea ordered his men to open fire on Fannin and his soldiers, along with about 100 other captured Texans. More than 400 men were executed that day at Goliad.

Ironically, rather than serving to crush the Texas rebellion, the Goliad Massacre helped inspire and unify the Texans. Now determined to break completely from Mexico, the Texas revolutionaries began to yell “Remember Goliad!” along with the more famous battle cry, “Remember the Alamo!” Less than a month later, Texan forces under General Sam Houston dealt a stunning blow to Santa Anna’s army in

Sam Houston, Texas Governor and Hero of Texas’s War of Independence

the Battle of San Jacinto, and Texas won its independence.

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Today in 1864, General James B. McPherson assumes command of the Union Army of the Tennessee

US General James B. McPherson, the highest ranking Union General killed in combat on July 22, 1864.

after William T. Sherman is promoted to the rank of commander of the Division of the Mississippi, and becomes the overall leader in the West.

McPherson was born in Ohio in 1828 and graduated first in his class from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 1853. He joined the Army’s engineering corps as a second lieutenant, and spent the pre-war years in New York City and Alcatraz Island in California. When the Civil War began, McPherson was transferred to the East and promoted to captain. Yearning for combat, he was disappointed when he was assigned to command the forts of Boston Harbor. McPherson contacted General Henry Halleck,

General Henry W. (“Old Brains”) Halleck

commander of the Department of the Missouri and a former acquaintance in California, who summon-ed him to St. Louis. In Missouri, McPherson helped set up recruiting stations and inspected defenses.

McPherson was transferred to General Ulysses S. Grant’s command on February 1, 1862, just as Grant

Lt. General Ulysses Grant

was launching an expedition against forts Henry and Donelson in Tennessee. McPherson’s work in analyzing the defenses of Fort Donelson earned him the respect of Grant, and McPherson’s star rose rapidly after the Battle of Shiloh in Tennessee in April 1862. McPherson fought with distinction, and was promoted to colonel. Two weeks later, he became a brigadier general. After his actions at the Battle of Corinth, Mississippi, in October 1862, McPherson was again promoted, this time to major general. In December, he capped a successful year by taking command of the XVII Corps in Grant’s Army of the Tennessee.

McPherson served as a corps commander throughout 1863, quite ably leading his men at Vicksburg, Mississippi, and Chattanooga, Tennessee. Grant’s promotion to general-in-chief of all Union forces created a chain reaction of promotions. Grant left for Washington, D.C., and Sherman assumed com-mand in the West, while McPherson inherited the Army of the Tennessee. This force was not an independent command, as it was one of three armies under Sherman’s leadership during the Atlanta campaign of 1864. When the campaign reached Atlanta in July 1864 after three hard months of fighting, McPherson was charged with attacking Confederate forces on the northeast side of the city. At the Battle of Peachtree Creek on July 22, McPherson was directing operations when he and his staff emerged from a grove of trees directly in front of the Confederate line. They were ordered to surrender but McPherson turned his horse and attempted to escape. He was mortally wounded, becoming the highest-ranking Union general killed in the war.

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What makes this rifle revolutionary is that it is a breech-loading model. The user opened the breech block for loading a cartridge simply by first pressing the weapon’s two trigger guards and then insert-ing a special brass cartridge, also invented by Burnside, to go into his new carbine. Whenever the user squeezed the trigger, the hammer fell on a percussion cap (self contained metal cartridges would not be invented for several years) and caused a spark; a hole in the base of the cartridge exposed the black powder to this spark. The unique, cone-shaped cartridge sealed the joint between the barrel and the breech. Most other breech-loading weapons of the day tended to leak hot gas when fired, but Burnside’s design had effectively eliminated this problem.

In 1857, the Burnside carbine won a competition at West Point against 17 other carbine designs that were vying for a contract to supply arms for the military. In spite of its proven superiority, few of the carbines were immediately ordered by the government. But then something happened that changed the fortunes of the company, and of the rifle’s creator. What happened? The Civil War happened. When the war opened, there was a sudden need for a great increase in the standing army, as many of the men left the Union Army to join the rebel army. But what were these new soldiers to shoot? The War Department decided to order 55,000 rifles for use by Union cavalrymen. This made it the third most popular carbine of the Civil War; with only the Sharps carbine and the Spencer carbine being more widely used in all theaters of the war. There were so many in service that many were captured and used by Confederates. A common complaint made by most of the men who used the Burnside carbine was that the unusually shaped cartridge sometimes became stuck in the breech after firing.

A review of both the ordnance returns (arms returned to the Army after the war or at other times) and the schedule of ammunition requisitions indicates that approximately 43 Union cavalry – as well as at least seven Confederate cavalry — regiments were using the Burnside carbine during the 1863-1864 period. The end of the war saw the end of production of the Burnside rifle, when the Burnside Rifle Company was given a contract to make Spencer carbines instead.

And what of the inventor? What happened to his career? Despite his being in the Army prior to the war, he had resigned to focus his energy on his new company, A. E. Burnside gained his promotions because of his carbine. A. E. Burnside, Ambrose E. Burnside, to give his name in full, was actually a military failure due to his lack of confidence in his skills. He had repeatedly turned down command of the Army of the Potomac when President Lincoln pushed the job on him, telling the President “I was not competent to command such a large army as this. Eventually, however, Burnside gave up refusing and accepted the command. He immediately led the Army of the Potomac to defeat at the Battle of Fredericksburg. The battle and the subsequent abortive offensive left many of Burnside’s officers en-raged and they eloquently and loudly expressed their rage to both the White House and the War Department about Burnside’s incompetence.” He also performed poorly at the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, and a subsequent court of inquiry also found him responsible for the Union failure at the Battle of the Crater.

The great western explorer and conservationist John Wesley Powell is born today, in 1834, near Palmyra, New York.

John Wesley Powell, western explorer and conservationist

The son of a Methodist minister, Powell imbibed his father’s theology as a boy. However, he was introduced to an alter-native point of view when the elderly naturalist George Crookham taught him basic natural science. For much of his youth, though, Powell had little time to contemplate either God or nature. As the eldest son, he took on much of the backbreaking work necessary to support his seven brothers and sisters on newly cleared farms, first in Wisconsin and then Illinois.

When he was 16, Powell struck out on his own. In 1852, he began teaching elementary school, which gave him time to improve his own education. During the next seven years, Powell took courses in natural science at Illinois, Wheaton, and Oberlin Colleges. He became a local expert on mollusks, attracting the approval of the Illinois Natural History Society. By the time the Civil War broke out, Illinois natural scientists knew him well.

An ardent abolitionist, Powell enlisted in the Union Army shortly after the attack on Fort Sumter. With characteristic discipline and determination, he rose quickly in the ranks and eventually became a major in command of a battery of artillery. During the Battle of Shiloh, Powell was badly wounded and lost his right arm below the elbow. After a few months recuperating, Powell returned to the Union Army and served out the rest of the war with distinction.

Returning to civilian life, Powell became a science teacher at several Illinois colleges. However, the quiet academic life did not suit him, and he began making a series of western expeditions to explore the geology of the Rocky Mountains. In 1869, Powell led 10 men in four small boats down the Green and Colorado Rivers, becoming the first Anglo to explore the cavernous depths of the Grand Canyon.

Regarded as only a serious amateur by some professional scientists, Powell was determined to demonstrate his ability. In 1871, he won a government grant to map the Colorado Plateau. His subsequent geological descriptions of that region introduced an entire new branch of geology called geomorphology. By 1876, Powell’s theories of the role of stream flows in wearing down mountains and creating river valleys had established him as a nationally recognized geologist.

Powell’s growing scientific prestige, as well as his uncanny ability to cultivate relationships with important politicians, made him a natural choice as the second director of the United States Geological Survey (USGS) in 1881. (The first director, Clarence King, had served less than two years). Under Powell’s guidance, the USGS became one of the most important federal scientific bureaus of the day.

Powell’s insistence on putting truth before politics eventually earned him powerful enemies. Some western politicians, eager to exploit the natural resources of the West, objected to Powell’s insistence on understanding the natural science of the region before developing it. His enemies finally succeeded in pushing Powell out of the USGS in 1894. He continued his scientific work within the Bureau of American Ethnology, another important scientific agency Powell had nurtured.

When he died in 1902, he was widely honored as a man of tremendous and varied talents. A soldier, teacher, explorer, geologist, and anthropologist, Powell played a pivotal role in the settlement and development of the American West.

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Today in 1862, at the First Battle of Kernstown, Virginia, Confederate General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson suffers a rare defeat when his attack on Union forces in the Shenandoah Valley fails.

Gen. Thomas J. Jackson, CSA

Jackson was trying to prevent Union General Nathaniel Banks from sending any troops from the Shenandoah to General George McClellan’s army near Washington, D.C. McClellan was preparing to

Union General George B. McClellan

send his massive army by water to the James Peninsula southeast of Richmond, Virginia, for a summer campaign against the Confederate capital. When Turner Ashby, Jackson’s able cavalry commander,

CSA Col., and Stonewall Jackson’s favorite cavalry commander.

detected that Yankee troops were moving out of the valley, Jackson decided to attack and keep the Union forces divided. Ashby attacked at Kernstown on March 22. He reported to Jackson that only four Union regiments were present–perhaps 3,000 men. In fact, Union commander James Shields actually had 9,000 men at Kernstown but kept most of them hidden during the skirmishing on March 22. The rest of Jackson’s force arrived the next day, giving the Confederates about 4,000 men. The 23rd was a Sunday, and the religious Jackson tried not to fight on the Sabbath. The Yankees could see his deploy-ment, though, so Jackson chose to attack that very afternoon. He struck the Union left flank, but the Federals moved troops into place to stop the Rebel advance. At a critical juncture, Richard Garnett

CSA General Richard B. Garnett

withdrew his Confederate brigade due to a shortage of ammunition, and this exposed another brigade to a Union attack. The Northern troops poured in, sending Jackson’s entire force in retreat.

Jackson’s troop losses included some 80 killed, 375 wounded, and 260 missing or captured, while the Union lost 118 dead, 450 wounded, and 22 missing. Despite the defeat, the battle had positive results for the Confederates. Unnerved by the attack, President Abraham Lincoln ordered McClellan to leave an entire corps to defend Washington, thus drawing troops from McClellan’s Peninsular Campaign. The battle was the opening of Jackson’s famous campaign in the Shenandoah Valley. Over the following three months, Jackson’s men marched hundreds of miles, won several major battles, and kept three separate Union forces occupied in the Shenandoah.

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